Stolen Pieces
by LiLAqUaMaRiE
Summary: From the moment the first one slipped away from him, he knew he wouldn’t be the same again.


**Title:** Stolen Pieces**  
Author:** LiLAqUaMaRiE  
**Fandom:** CSI: Miami  
**Pairings/Characters:** Horatio Caine  
**Rating:** T  
**Genre:** Drama, angst  
**Spoilers: **No spoilers.  
**Word Count: **945  
**Challenge Fic:** #4  
**Challenge Word:** #005 – Death  
**Summary:** From the moment the first one slipped away from him, he knew he wouldn't be the same again.  
**Disclaimer:** I don't own "CSI: Miami" or anything related to it. So don't sue me please!!!! I'm already poor as it is. Don't need a lawsuit to put me out on the street.  
**Note:** This is a fic for the MiamiFicTalk Community prompt challenge.

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"The Angel of Death has been abroad throughout the land, you may almost hear the beating of his wings." – John Bright

Inside a dark and somber apartment was a broken man. He was alone as he sat upon the sofa within his living room in silence; he had his head within his hands. No thoughts ran through his mind – it was blank, just like his soul was. All he had wanted was to be alone, wanted to be away from everyone and anything – just him and his dark sanctuary that he had once called a home filled with laughter.

The man was beyond happy or sad as his emotions were no longer in turmoil – they had been destroyed so long ago. Too much had come and gone that had broken his soul into little pieces instead of leaving it whole as it should have been once upon a time. He knew he was a man that outwardly, he resembled a person that had no troubles – that was fine. While on the other hand, inwardly he was a person that was inconsolable, that was not well – that would never be well again.

He had lost so much with his life, too many things that had slipped away from him in a snap of a finger. It was a simple fact; things that he had once held dear had been taken away. Taken away by the Angel of Death who had visited him so many times in the past and with each visit it had made, it had claimed something from him as its own. It first started with his mother, then it led to his friend, his wife and his brother and now even his soul was all gone. Too much had been taken, too much that they were no longer retainable. Too much that he wished he had more tears to shed over but even that was lost to him as well.

The man had felt as if fate had cheated him from any happiness he could have had. He had also felt betrayed – lost as if his reason for living was to only suffer and that was a fact he was reminded of daily. Moreover, the man had and would always miss them all – each differently and equally – with his entire being; miss them all so bad that it used to hurt, but now that pain resembled a dull ache within his body.

He knew he could never forget them, they were always within his broken heart like ghost haunting a room – they haunted his heart. He even remembers each one of their death clearly as if it had happened all over again and the saddest part of each and every one of them was that he didn't get around to say goodbye to any one of them, not even to his soul. He used to pray to who ever would listen, asking if they could bring back what had been taken from him – but in the end, it was all just a useless idea.

Each claim that the Angel of Death made was a crime, a crime that he was unable to stop from being committed; a crime that had hurt others but above all it had hurt him the most. Though he would never show it in public, he can never show it. No one was allowed to see and no one was allowed to know about it. To everyone else he was the pillar of strength, the support that everyone can lean on, the calm to anyone's storm, and the hero that anyone can count on to save the day.

And in his mind, that was something that could not change at all.

He finally understood that he was a man that was meant to be a loner all his life. He couldn't allow himself to get attached to anyone else – one more loss and it would send him over the edge of the cliff. He wouldn't and couldn't stand another gunshot wound to his heart.

The man realized that people depended on him just as he depended on death. The man knew he was not supposed to think like he was doing, he also knew that anyone who was able to catch a glimpse at his mind would run away in fear or shock, but it was something he was unable to stop. It was just something that was uncontrollable. Death had become part of him as he had become part of it; it resembled a double-sided coin – there was no other way around it.

It was simple to understand. He depended on the Angel of Death to come and take what was left of him just as it came and took everything else from him. To take it all away and hopefully allow him to be reunited with everything that had once been stolen. It has been the only reason he has had to keep on living – waiting for that faithful day to arrive and hoping it wouldn't slip him by.

However, as he waits, he tries with all that he has left to be there for those who look up to him, those who depend on him and still need him. While he knows he could never allow himself to get attached to anyone emotionally nor physically ever again, he couldn't bear to lose someone else, someone under his care – not this time around. Losing someone would make him lose the last grip he has on reality and that something he hopes to never come close to.

And as he does this, he knows it just for the time being until the Angel of Death visits him once again only this time to claim him instead.

So until that time, Horatio Caine waits with the one thing he has left.

Patience.

**FIN.**


End file.
